Snapshot of a Night On-Call

Take a shower. Dress nice. Feel dread, feel fear. Look at myself in the mirror and tell myself, “self, snap out of it.” Pack my bag, head to hospital, feel joy, feel anticipation. Want to turn around and drive home. But don’t. Walk through hospital doors, clock in and put on pager and ID badge, feel competent, feel official. Go to office, organize things, look at pager every 5 minutes, feel neurotic. Want to be paged a lot, want not to be paged at all. Check my email too many times. Try to settle down and read. Doesn’t work. Go out to dinner with hubby and mom, try to stay present, all the while feeling on-edge and nervously glancing at pager with increasing frequency. That thing owns me tonight. Go back to hospital, meet Jonathan and Lynnea, give all 4 people a tour. Feel professional, feel proud. Hang out until 11:30, feel tired, then go back to my office to make my bed. Get some sleep, not sound sleep, I am at a hospital on-call and my pager is 10 inches from my head, but sleep nonetheless. No page wakes me up, only my own anxiety of a potential page. 8am comes. Off duty. Turn the pager off. Relax.